Lopes, The Challenger Deep–Sea Expedition The Challenger Deep–Sea Expedition (1872-1876) in Brazil: the circulation of news and knowledge Maria Margaret LOPES Conselho Nacional de Desenvolvimento Científico e Tecnológico - CNPq, Brazil Universidade de Brasília - Universidade de São Paulo doi.org/10.26337/2532-7623/LOPES Riassunto: Il presente articolo evidenzia esempi di giornali e pubblicazioni nazionali sulla British H.M.S. Challenger Deep Sea Expedition in Brasile, attraverso un’analisi esaustiva, fino ai primi decenni del XX secolo. Tuttavia, lo scopo non è quello di trattare i dettagli della Challenger Expedition, che è già oggetto di una vasta bibliografia, ma piuttosto di delineare alcuni esempi di ciò che è stato pubblicato sul Brasile e in particolare di ciò che è stato detto del Challenger in Brasile, sia nei giornali locali che nelle pubblicazioni nazionali. Abstract: This paper highlights examples of newspapers and national publications about the British H.M.S. Challenger Deep-Sea Expedition in Brazil, through a comprehensive survey, until the first decades of the twentieth century. However, the purpose is not to address details of the Challenger Expedition, which is already the subject of a vast bibliography, but rather to outline some examples of what was printed about Brazil and particularly of what was said of the Challenger in Brazil, in the local newspapers and national publications. Keywords: Challenger, expeditions, Brazil Introduction1 Undeniably, due to concerns related to navigation, occupations, trade, fishing, migration, communication, warfare, transportation and leisure, for centuries the oceans and seas have played prominent roles in social, economic, political and scientific concerns of peoples and governments and thus in historiography2. But it was in the second half of the nineteenth century that the oceans became part of expanding and different political–scientific projects for the investigation of large spaces, such as meteorological studies, the exploration of the Arctic3 or terrestrial magnetism4. From the perspective of the history of science, a new dimension was added to the studies of the oceans and seas: the size of their depths – the Deep Sea5. Collections, maps, reports and articles organized by experts from the collections and accumulated data by numerous Deep–Sea Expeditions and especially by the English Challenger Expedition (1872–1876)6, added a whole new field of knowledge related to the hydrographical, oceanographical, biological, climatological, geographical and geological processes. 1 The author thanks Fabio D’Angelo, Irina Podgorny, Valter Ponte, Beverly Young and the support of the CNPq to the Research Productivity Project – proc. 306046/2014–8. Oceanos – capítulos estratégicos na história das ciências geológicas (1870 – 1950) (2015–2018), in which this paper was produced. 2 D. ARMITAGE, M. J. BRADDICK (eds.) The British Atlantic World, 1500-1800, Basingstoke and New York, Palgrave Macmillan, 2002. P. HORDEN, S. KINOSHITA, A Companion to Mediterranean History. Wiley Blackwell Companions to World History, Chichester, John Wiley &Sons Ltd, 2014. 3 R. REGARD (ed.), Artic Exploration in the Nineteenth Century: Discovering the Northwest passage, (Empires in perspective), London, Pickering & Chatto Limited, 2013. 4 J. CAWOOD, The Magnetic Crusade: Science an Politics in Early Victorian Britain, in «Isis», 70 (1979/4), pp. 492-518. 5 H. ROZWADOWSKI, Fanthoming the Ocean. The Discovery and Exploration of the Deep Sea, Cambridge and London, The Belknap Press of Harvard University Press, 2008. 6 Report on the scientific results of the voyage of H.M.S. Challenger during the years 1873–76 under the command of Captain George S. Nares and the late Captain Frank Tourle Thomson. Prepared under the superintendence of the late Sir C. Wyville Thomson and now of John Murray. Published by order of Her Majesty's government. http://www.19thcenturyscience.org/HMSC/HMSC-INDEX/index-illustrated.htm (Last access 02-02-2018). The other mentions to the texts of the Challenger Expedition when not indicated refer to this Report. 118 Lopes, The Challenger Deep-Sea Expedition In Brazil, these initiatives related to the investigation of ocean depths in the second half of the nineteenth century, as well as throughout the world, were followed by newspapers. The scientific community, the journals and newspapers reported on the difficulties and scientific and technological achievements regarding the undertakings of the deep–sea expeditions, such as the British Challenger (1872–1876) and others. But until today the oceans and seas have not been more broadly studied by the History of Science and Technology in Brazil7. So this paper results from a thorough survey in Brazilian newspapers and publications to present an overview of the less known examples of the repercussions of these deep–sea expeditions in the country, as a contribution toward interpreting these endeavors. The Challenger Expedition (1872–1876) was carried out with the support of the Royal Society and the British Navy led by the renowned biologist Charles Wyville Thomson (1830–1882) who had already participated in other expeditions such as the Lightning and the Porcupine in the 1860s. After Thomson’s death, John Murray (1841–1914) – the naturalist of the Challenger and who would become a leading authority on ocean studies –coordinated the publication of 50 volumes for nearly twenty years, with the results of the investigations carried out by the main experts of the time. During the 41 months in which the expedition covered about 68,890 nautical miles (or 127,580 km) while sailing the oceans, a multitude of data from hundreds of deep sea soundings, bottom dredges, open water trawls and serial water temperature observations and thousands of water samples and 600 cases of zoological, botanical, geological compilations were collected. In addition to thousands of studies and sediment samplings from different sea depths, it is estimated that as a result of their collections 715 new genera and 4,500 new species of marine organisms were described by renowned experts and which are currently deposited in museums8. In the majority of traditional historiography concerning Oceanography, the Challenger Expedition is presented as the initial landmark of the modern discipline, which has been widely accepted by practically all the international classical works and countless manuals about Oceanography, in Brazil as well, until the first decades of the 20th century. However, in the approach questioning the official historiography of the founding fathers, other aspects of the Challenger journeys were already problematized, such as the financial gains amassed by Murray as a result of his scientific concerns regarding the processes of coral reef formation9. These investigations led to the identification and later exploitation of phosphate sources, used as essential fertilizers in English farming and the wealth of the acclaimed protagonist of the Oceanography discipline, in which he invested part of his financial resources in his own scientific research and in the production of the Challenger volumes. And it is no longer possible to characterize the Challenger Expedition as a ‘pure science expedition’ with unexpected results10. One cannot ignore that one of the 7 A. HEIZER et al, Carta das editoras convidadas, Histórias, ciências e políticas de oceanos e mares, in «Revista História, Ciência, Saúde – Manguinhos», 21 (2014/3), pp. 803–804. 8 See: The Natural History Museum. Ocean Bottom deposit collection. ‘The Museum’s ocean bottom deposit collection consists of samples from about 40,000 locations around the world… The most important sub–collection is the Sir John Murray Collection, which includes sea–bed samples from the HMS Challenger expedition (1872-76). It was given to the Museum by the Murray family in 1921 following his death in 1914’ http://www.nhm.ac.uk/our- science/collections/mineralogy-collections/ocean-bottom-deposit-collection.html (Last access 02-02-2018). 9 Murray was not able to have his ideas about coral reefs displace Darwin’s theory of coral reef formation based on subsidence. As Murray believed in the permanence of oceans basin, he could not apply subsidence as the phenomena that explained coral reef formation. However, it can be said that Murray contributed to the debate about subsidence, which was opposed to the theory of ocean basins long–term geological permanence. M. E. JOHNSON, B. G. BAARLI, Charles Darwin in the Cape Verde and Galápagos archipelagos: The role of serendipity in development of theories on the ups and downs of oceanic islands, in «Earth Sciences History», 34 (2015/2), pp. 220-242. 10 H. L. BURSTYN, Science Pays Off: Sir John Murray and the Christmas Island Phosphate Industry,1886-1914, in «Social Studies of Science», 5 (1975), pp. 5-34. The works of John Murray also established the general morphology of the deep– sea floor and the fundamental differences between the sediment deposits from shallow waters, continental shelves and deep waters. The confirmation of the existence of mineral resources (polymetallic nodules) of possible economic interest in large areas of the ocean depths proved to be one of the many highly relevant results obtained by the Challenger Expedition. The polymetallic nodules have become in the last years the subject of international research and investments aimed at the economic exploitation of these resources, with heavy environmental impacts. J. MURRAY, A. F. RENARD, Report on the Deep-Sea Deposits Based on the Specimens Collected During the Voyage of H. M. S. Challenger in the years 1872 to 1876, in Report on the scientific results...; F. J. A.S. BARRIGA, Ciência e recursos naturais debaixo do mar 119 Lopes, The Challenger Deep-Sea Expedition mains interests of the project of the voyage the endeavor awakened was not only the potential commercial fisheries all over the world, but also safer navigation routes and assuring the appropriation of the seas and its depth. In fact, in dealing with the overall scientific importance of the Challenger Expedition and the scientific results gained, undoubtedly the expedition represents a turning point in the history of Oceanography.